flies around
naked
in
Night Kitchen,
and Max from
Where the Wild Things Are,
gay!”
“Bullshit, Max isn’t gay.”
“Bull true, he dresses up in his little white wolf suit, so gay. And then he tells his mom to fuck off…”
“That’s not gay…”
“. . . and then he goes to an island and hangs around with a bunch of monsters who party with him all night, dancing and parading him around on their backs.”
“That’s so weird, but I think it’s kind of true,” said Fred.
“All little-kids’ stories have to be like that. They have to be all soft and gay, so that the moms are okay with it.”
Fred sat there, and then he said, “
I
want a wolf suit.”
“Yeah, me too,” I said.
“I can’t think of anything sexier than a skintight, furrywolf suit,” said Fred. He was really laughing a lot, almost too loud. Those three bakers looked like they were laughing too.
That night I had a dream. There were rainbows everywhere and I was driving all over town in my dad’s busted car, wearing a white wolf suit. The car was making this horrible grinding sound with a whine underneath it. Whenever I hit another car, it just bounced off me and I would cackle.
Two days later, I went into the library to work. The place was empty as usual. I stopped at the front desk. Judy, the brown-haired one, was there.
“I really like it here,” I said.
“We like
you,
Teddy,” she said. “You’re always welcome here, even after everything is over.”
I said thank you and walked toward the back room. Down the hall, Mags, the gray-haired one, came out of the bathroom and slowly made her way toward me. When we passed, I smiled, and she smiled a wrinkled smile and said quietly, “Good boy, good boy.”
Fred didn’t come in. I rediscovered all the Bill Peet books. He usually wrote about animals and drew great pictures. I went through all of them. There was one about a hermit crab called Kermit the Hermit who hoarded all his stuff, and one about clumsy circus lions, and another about a little mountain goat with huge horns that he could ski on, and a peacock with a scary face patterned into his plume, and a pig with the map of the world on its side, and this clumsy beast that was part rhino, part giraffe, elephant, camel, zebra with reindeer horns called a Whingdingdilly. And there was this one about a dopey sea serpent named Cyrus that terrorized galleons.It was good to read those books again; all the feelings came back to me.
Once upon a time there was a giant sea serpent named Cyrus. Even though he was a horrible looking monster he wasn’t the least bit fierce. All he ever did was wander about in the sea with no idea of where he was going.
“I’m tired of wandering,” said Cyrus one day. “I wish there was something more exciting to do. . . .”
Part II
Wasting
Things got bad at the Children’s Library. I started taking the books home without checking them out and then not returning them. Sometimes Fred and I would get high and draw dicks and pussies on the animals in the books and then put them back on the shelves. One time I was in the Secret Garden and I tried to carve APRIL into the bench, but I didn’t finish because one of the librarians came out, so the carving just said APRI, but the R was a little unfinished and the I was really light.
Then one day after school, my mom told me my probation officer wanted me to call her. I called from the kitchen phone while my mom washed vegetables in the sink. As the phone rang I watched my mother with the vegetables and I realized what a small woman she was.
“Hi, Janice,” I said into the phone.
“Teddy, I’m gonna need you to come to my office on Tuesday after school.”
“That’s the day I go to the Children’s Library.”
“You’re not going there anymore and you know it.”
“What do you mean? I love that place,” I said, and my mother looked over.
“Well, you screwed it up,” she said. “I’ll see you at three twenty on Tuesday. Don’t be
naked
in
Night Kitchen,
and Max from
Where the Wild Things Are,
gay!”
“Bullshit, Max isn’t gay.”
“Bull true, he dresses up in his little white wolf suit, so gay. And then he tells his mom to fuck off…”
“That’s not gay…”
“. . . and then he goes to an island and hangs around with a bunch of monsters who party with him all night, dancing and parading him around on their backs.”
“That’s so weird, but I think it’s kind of true,” said Fred.
“All little-kids’ stories have to be like that. They have to be all soft and gay, so that the moms are okay with it.”
Fred sat there, and then he said, “
I
want a wolf suit.”
“Yeah, me too,” I said.
“I can’t think of anything sexier than a skintight, furrywolf suit,” said Fred. He was really laughing a lot, almost too loud. Those three bakers looked like they were laughing too.
That night I had a dream. There were rainbows everywhere and I was driving all over town in my dad’s busted car, wearing a white wolf suit. The car was making this horrible grinding sound with a whine underneath it. Whenever I hit another car, it just bounced off me and I would cackle.
Two days later, I went into the library to work. The place was empty as usual. I stopped at the front desk. Judy, the brown-haired one, was there.
“I really like it here,” I said.
“We like
you,
Teddy,” she said. “You’re always welcome here, even after everything is over.”
I said thank you and walked toward the back room. Down the hall, Mags, the gray-haired one, came out of the bathroom and slowly made her way toward me. When we passed, I smiled, and she smiled a wrinkled smile and said quietly, “Good boy, good boy.”
Fred didn’t come in. I rediscovered all the Bill Peet books. He usually wrote about animals and drew great pictures. I went through all of them. There was one about a hermit crab called Kermit the Hermit who hoarded all his stuff, and one about clumsy circus lions, and another about a little mountain goat with huge horns that he could ski on, and a peacock with a scary face patterned into his plume, and a pig with the map of the world on its side, and this clumsy beast that was part rhino, part giraffe, elephant, camel, zebra with reindeer horns called a Whingdingdilly. And there was this one about a dopey sea serpent named Cyrus that terrorized galleons.It was good to read those books again; all the feelings came back to me.
Once upon a time there was a giant sea serpent named Cyrus. Even though he was a horrible looking monster he wasn’t the least bit fierce. All he ever did was wander about in the sea with no idea of where he was going.
“I’m tired of wandering,” said Cyrus one day. “I wish there was something more exciting to do. . . .”
Part II
Wasting
Things got bad at the Children’s Library. I started taking the books home without checking them out and then not returning them. Sometimes Fred and I would get high and draw dicks and pussies on the animals in the books and then put them back on the shelves. One time I was in the Secret Garden and I tried to carve APRIL into the bench, but I didn’t finish because one of the librarians came out, so the carving just said APRI, but the R was a little unfinished and the I was really light.
Then one day after school, my mom told me my probation officer wanted me to call her. I called from the kitchen phone while my mom washed vegetables in the sink. As the phone rang I watched my mother with the vegetables and I realized what a small woman she was.
“Hi, Janice,” I said into the phone.
“Teddy, I’m gonna need you to come to my office on Tuesday after school.”
“That’s the day I go to the Children’s Library.”
“You’re not going there anymore and you know it.”
“What do you mean? I love that place,” I said, and my mother looked over.
“Well, you screwed it up,” she said. “I’ll see you at three twenty on Tuesday. Don’t be
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